The ability of Command Centres to pull in streams of real-time data from multiple sources will support Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust as its aims reduce unnecessary hospital stays.

GE Healthcare will aim to increase adoption of the model and this will be supported by evidence of reduced wait times in the US.

The decision to make GE Healthcare into a standalone unit, could give it greater flexibility to pursue future growth opportunities in areas such as Bioprocessing and digital solutions.

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Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is collaborating with GE Healthcare to build a Command Centre at the Bradford Royal Infirmary (BRI), UK. The first to be established in Europe, the Command Centre is designed to improve the delivery and organisation of care as hospital attendances increase. Utilising artificial intelligence (AI), it will provide an instant, and real-time overview across the 800-bed hospital, enabling staff to make quick and informed decisions on how to best manage patient care. Bradford Teaching Hospitals' Command Centre will open in Q219.

The provision of healthcare data in real time is an advancement compared with the current standard, with hospitals usually dealing with historical information. Up to 20 Trust staff based in the Command Centre will monitor a 'wall of analytics' that constantly pulls in streams of real-time data from the multiple systems at the hospital, such as electronic health records (EHRs), picture archive and communication systems (PACS), laboratories, staffing systems, ambulance information, and numerous information sources, both in and outside of the trust. The advanced algorithms employed will help staff to anticipate and resolve bottlenecks in care delivery before they occur, recommending actions to enable faster, more responsive patient care and better allocation of resources. We note that it is the combination of AI and experienced practitioners following a rules-based protocol that will help care teams operate more efficiently, rather than AI alone.

The Command Centre will aim to reduce unnecessary hospital admissions. The centre will be located centrally in a refurbished space at the BRI site and it will help to reduce unnecessary time spent in hospital after a patient is medically ready to leave, increase the proportion of patients who arrive and are admitted, transferred or discharged from A&E (Emergency Department) within four hours, and help ensure that patients are always treated in the wards best suited to manage their care. Further, the Command Centre programme helps meet the vision of Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust to decrease length of stay, alleviate the need for additional wards and beds - especially during peak winter times - and reduce cancellations for non-emergency surgery. Over 96% of bed capacity at BRI is used regularly and it has 125,000 A&E attendances each year, up by more than 40% over the past decade. A&E demand has been on the increase in general across the UK, largely due to an ageing demographic; the proportion of those presenting who are frail, elderly and have multiple conditions is increasing.

GE Healthcare will aim to increase adoption of the model and this will be supported by evidence of reduced wait times in the US. In October 2018, GE Healthcare also collaborated with CHI Francisan Health in Washington to implement an AI-powered command centre. Command Centres have been adopted by several hospitals in North America including The Johns Hopkins Hospital, a major not-for-profit 1,100 bed hospital in Baltimore, US, and Humber River Hospital, Toronto, Canada. Since the Command Centre began operating at Johns Hopkins, patients from other hospitals are transferred 60% faster, Emergency Room (A&E) wait times have been cut by 25%, and time spent waiting in the operating theatre for a post-surgical bed decreased by 70%. There are also centres at Oregon Health Sciences University, AdventHealth Orlando and Tampa General Hospital.

GE Healthcare will aim to strengthen as a pure-play business. In June 2018, GE announced the results of its strategic review; with the company opting to focus on Aviation, Power and Renewable Energy, creating a simpler industrial company. In addition to the pending combination of its Transportation business with Wabtec, GE plans to separate GE Healthcare into a standalone company over the next 12-18 months, and to fully separate its 62.5% interest in BHGE (an oil and gas servicing and equipment player). These actions are intended to make GE's corporate structure leaner and substantially reduce debt.

The strategic review substantially completes GE's divestiture target as the company aims to streamline operations and improve shareholder returns. The decision to make GE Healthcare into a standalone unit, could give it greater flexibility to pursue future growth opportunities in areas such as Bioprocessing and digital solutions. However, GE Healthcare will assume approximately USD18bn in liabilities from its parent company's debt, which could limit room for manoeuvre (see, 'US-Based GE Healthcare Aims To Strengthen As Pure-Play Business', June 28 2018).